Well-travelled Turner carries $250,000 tag

By DON MILNE saleroom correspondent

The painting of the fishmarket at Rotterdam is tiny - just 19cm by 13cm.

But it should sell for at least a quarter of a million dollars when it comes up at auction in Auckland on April 8. Because this 1836 watercolour is by Joseph Mallord William Turner, regarded by many critics as the greatest of all English artists.

And, while Turner produced many works based on scenes in France, Germany, Italy and Switzerland, this is thought to be his only known watercolour of a Dutch subject.

It is also unusual for Turner in the number of figures in the foreground, with even a pile of fresh fish, shown in front of a wonderfully coloured vista of domes and towers.

Peter Webb Galleries is selling the international work on behalf of Anne and Thomas Johnston, who are nearing 80 and live in New Plymouth.

Their son Ian Johnston said: "It came to my mother, Anne Helene Johnston, in the early 1990s, as a bequest from her aunt, Mrs Ragnhild Rhodes, who lived in Oslo. My mother's mother died young and Ragnhild, as the younger sister, and my mother became very close."

Mrs Rhodes, a Norwegian, nursed in England during the war and married an Englishman. They bought the Turner in 1947 from noted London art dealers Thomas Agnew and Sons, for 200 guineas. Mr Dunstan Rhodes died soon after, and Mrs Rhodes returned to Oslo. She bequeathed her artworks to family, with the Turner going to Mrs Johnston.

Mrs Johnston and her NZ husband, Thomas, a professor emeritus of arts who taught for more than 20 years in the United States, came back to retire in New Zealand.

"They love the Turner but, with the rising costs of insurance and security ... they just can't afford to have it hanging on their wall," said Mr Johnston.

Auctioneer Peter Webb says that the work was known through etchings, but no one knew where the original was until it turned up in New Plymouth.

Webb's have suggested an estimate of $250,000 to $350,000, but international interest could see the price go higher.